HEALTH. It’s such a simple word, but it can mean A MULTITUDE of different things to different people. There are countless diets and ways of eating (or not eating) that claim to be the BEST or the PERFECT way to eat… but in reality… no way of eating is better than another. It’s really easy…

Hiiiiiiiiiiiiii, thanks for hopping over to Issy Is Happy today!! I am so excited to be back. Lately, I have been in a BLOG SLUMP. It’s not that I haven’t been inspired or haven’t wanted to blog, I’ve just had apprehensions. I have been MAJORLY overwhelmed with school and have been experiencing a ton of stress +…

I’m not writing this post because this is a topic that I totally understand and can share my easy + simple tips on how to understand it for yourself… It’s actually kind of the opposite. This is something I’m writing about so that I can start to believe it myself. SELF LOVE is something that I desperately need……

Some days, no matter how hard you try.. you just feel OFF… Not necessarily for any certain reason, you just feel a little off balance or not yourself. Last week was full of days like this for me. It doesn’t really mean that you’re having a completely terrible day, and of course there are good…

Well hey there blog readers! It has been quite a while since I’ve been able to get my thoughts out on here! I’ve made a few blog posts here and there, but simply didn’t feel quite ready to publish anything. I figured that, now, the best way to get my thoughts from my head to ACTUAL WORDS…

This year, for our THIRD annual family vacation (with my dad’s side of the fam), we traveled to JAMAICA! I definitely had a relaxing week and loved getting to spend time with some of my favorite people. We ALL tried new things, learned more about each other, and enjoyed some much needed rest! One of my…

I’m just going to say it. I’m tired of bulimia. I’m tired of being so insanely worried about every little food I put in my body. I’m tired of hiding from my family and friends. I’m tired of hurting my body and making my life worse. No one likes to talk about bulimia- it’s gross and sad…

The lake is one of the most peaceful places in the world. Something about being amongst the sunshine, fresh air, and comfort of the lake refreshes me and fills me with joy. Especially since I got to spend time with my wonderful wonderful grandparents, brothers, cousin, parents, and *obviously* John Clark too 😉 I got LOTS…

It’s no secret that some days are better than others. Some days every thing just goes smoothly while the next day can wreck your brain and take you completely off course. Some days are unexplainably happy and some are not as good for unrecognizable reasons. Monday, I was feeling pretty content, for the most part….

Last week was QUITE the unusual week. Because of a school trip, half my class was out on Thursday and Friday- so the rest of us (kinda sorta) opted not to go to class on the days they were gone… which gave yours truly a really nice *mini-break* from school 🙂 Sharing a few highlights! On Thursday,…

Coming at you today with some straight to the point REALNESS. I have an eating disorder. Specifically: bulimia {getting sick after eating}, orthorexia {an obsession with healthy eating and exercise} and malnutrition. This is not self-diagnosed and not something that I’ve only recently dealt with. I’ve struggled with disordered eating and over-exercising for years now- but over the past couple months it has…

I missed quite of few of my happy days posts (on instagram) over the weekend, BUT I did indeed have a lot of happy moments! Today I’m sharing a few pictures + a summary of each day that I didn’t post!! Hope you had a peaceful and joyful longer weekend + Valentines Day 🙂 …

Hi loves!!! This post means a lot to me, so thank you so much for clicking on it! I recently restarted the **100 HAPPY DAYS** challenge on Instagram, which means that everyday I reflect back on the day and talk about the different, little things that brought me joy. I’ve done this challenge once before,…

Hellooooo love 🙂 Welcome to Issy Is Happy. Today, I’m going to do a little reflecting & let you in on my thoughts + adventures from the past (school) week! School wise, the week went pretty well. School is the place where I feel secure (even when it’s tough). I love the people I’m around, I can genuinely…

Don’t fear snacking and/or hunger. There is *surprisingly* a lot of controversy over this simple activity: SNACKING. Some health-nuts believe that you should eat 3 large meals a day so that you avoid snacking; while others say that your day should consist of 5 SMALL meals a day so that your body is never under fueled. Here’s…

Hi hi hiiiii! As I’m typing this I am having a hard time NOT just bursting from excitement! I did some blog shopping / brainstorming today and have gained a sudden vigor / burst of inspiration for Issy Is Happy! I am sooo looking forward to this year of blogging. I decided that each month…

Welcome to the first post of the new year!!!! I’ve missed you all and highly appreciate your choice to click on this post 😉 This year for New Year’s Eve, Bizzy and I decided to take a quick trip to Birmingham for the day! We felt very adult and were so pumped to have a…

THIS IS SUPER SUPER LATE but (alas) I did not want to miss out on posting these!!! Here is a day in pictures from this year’s TURKEY DAY!!! This was our first Thanksgiving at home in a long long long time and we had such a great, family-centered, delicious food-filled day 🙂 We started off…

I should probably be studying right now, my obsessive desire to remember everything that happens to me has taken ahold of me at the moment, soooo here we go! It’s a TUESDAY daily blog- enjoyyyy! :)))) I started out the morning waking up one minute before my alarm and turning it off as fast as…

This post is a little different than normal! Today, I am sharing my feelings on my hip injury because you know that homegirl can’t keep her thoughts inside her head:)))) Pumped to say that I am currently getting ready for the StarWars Half Marathon in Disney World! It’s not until April but I’ve been…

You can tell when a person is truly happy by the energy that they radiate. When you’re truly happy, you don’t have to force out good feelings- you just enjoy them. Today was one of those days:: Today is the day of my first ever ACT TEST// EEK. I started off nervously waking up to…

Starting a new style of blog posts on Issy Is Happy to hopefully provide an attainable, simple, helpful approach to big topics like confidence, self love, healthy living, and MOOOORE. Today we’re talking all about self love because it’s a really important issue that needs to be talked about!!! I want you to appreciate who you are…

I am a huge morning person, but with school work, later bedtimes and earlier wake up calls- it is a bit more difficult to enjoy TOLERATE getting out of your cozy bed. For some (probably odd reason) I’ve said for years now that mornings *even school mornings* are my favorite part of the day. There’s just…

SELF CONSCIOUSNESS: Up until around like, my 6th grade years of life, I wasn’t self conscious. I grew up in a neighborhood filled with my best friends who I knew I could make laugh and would love me when I wear citrus fruit-themed 2 piece outfits. We all loved each other and didn’t even notice our…

Goals are good. And goals are hard to achieve UNLESS you write them out… or tell someone… or actually desire to reach them. I think it’s really great to make goals for all areas of life (whether that be school, work, relationships, health, etc.) so today I’m talking BLOG GOALS. That way, you can keep…

Hi. What’s going on loves??? How has your week been so far? For me, this week has just been a little OFF– like not feeling terrible, but not quite my usual super happy self. Some weeks/days are like that and it’s really important to not get bogged down, but to just keep moving forward- making…

HEYO it’s time for PART TWO of my week recap! Today’s is FRIDAY-SUNDAY and yesterday was MONDAY-FRIDAY because I write wayyyy too much and didn’t want to bombard you with my words ((all at once))! I feel kinda weird posting these because I don’t want to make it seem like I think my life is better than everyone…

It’s that time of the week again! Its MONDAY aka WEEK RECAP day and I’m happy to say that it is also WEEK TWO of my brand spankin’ new BLOG POSTIN’ SCHEDULE. If you forgot or didn’t see the post of IIH’s FB page, I will now be posting week recaps on sunday and monday //…

Hi and thanks for clicking-on over to my first ever FITNESS FRIDAY. This is something I’ve been wanting to do for so long and I am oh so excited to start doing post like this every week! Fitness / health / and nutrition are HUGE parts of my life and three things that I am…

Do you go through phases confidence and self-love? You may find yourself being super confident in one moment only to be taken down in an INSTANT by even the littlest things, such as: hearing a negative comment that a friend said about you *even if it wasn’t intended to hurt you*, looking in the mirror mid-day…

Journaling is very important to me. I would have no clue what I did the past week if I didn’t journal. It’s a little ridiculous how much I write down… (down to the littlest things!! Ex: “did my homework in bed”, “clean clothes!!” or *I swear I wrote it just like this* “LARABARS”) ;)) This post…

I like to stop and think about how different my life was LAST YEAR. It’s quite strange to me that this time last year I was still at Montgomery Academy and preeeeeetty unsure of how life *for that year* was going to play out. I’ve talked about it before *when discussing my anxiety/depression* so you may know…

Bringing you a WEEK RECAP/HIGHLIGHTS REEL because blogging has been stressing me out to the max because…. I have way too much in my head and I hate to blog when I feel like I haven’t let you know what I’ve been up to / where I’ve been and I love blogging and desperately need…

hey hey heeeeeeeey! Welcome my Wednesday DAY IN DA LIFE blog. (it’s slightly more interesting than the last 2 days!) // Woke up Wednesday morning around 8:30 and let the normal “waking up” routine commence:: read my devotion for the day, finished/published my post to the blog + Facebook + instagram. For breakfast, I had *SHOCKER*…

HEYO!!! WELCOME TO MY TUESDAY IT’S PRETTY CRAZY. Tuesday was another really happy day. Positivity and peace can really make your days better. I was feeling really bad about myself a few days ago, I was confident that I needed to lose weight and ashamed of myself. I’m bad at talking about my struggles but…

hi hi hiiiiiiiiiiiii! This week I am going to DAILY BLOG in more of a ‘journal entry’ style to give *you* a look into what I do in a day {because I know you are dying to know! hehehe} I tend to really like mondays. They give you a fresh, new start and a…

Hello my lovely readers! Today you have the awesome privilege of reading this GUEST POST from Elizabeth Anne (Bizzy) Kocher! Bizzy is seriously one of the most precious people I know and she blew my away with this post!!! Bizzy is constantly encouraging me and my walk with the Lord; she shines for Him and uses her gifts…

I have had this quick and energy-boosting treat before almost every workout in the past few days. I don’t know why I had never thought of doing this before! It takes less than 5 minutes to whip up and is jam-packed with easily digestible, simple ingredients. Pre workout snacks can be hard because you can’t…

hello! I feel like I have a million things running through my head right now and I NEED to get some thoughts ouuuuuuut of my brain. And what better place to put my thoughts than the internet?!?! Let’s jump into it. As most of you know, confidence is something that I (along with most…

Hi there!! You have no idea how easy this recipe is. Like it’s almost too easy… yet it LOOKS super fancy and it LOOKS like you put a lot of time into making this summery, fresh dish! It only requires 5 INGREDIENTS (plus salt + pepper) and you don’t even USE AN OVEN! We gobbled…

This week, my mom and brother are up north on a college tour sooooo… I get to be the MOMMY of the family for the week! My dad will be at work during the day, so I’ll be watching over my little brother Will. I get to plan/make our meals, run errands and clean the…

[Thoughts from Tuesday June 30, 2015] Today, I learned an important lesson. I headed on over to Strength class at Irontribe this morning and was pretty stoked. This cycle is focusing on snatches (squat snatches for me!!!) which I love to work on because it’s very hard for me and requires a lot of focus…

hiiiiiiiiiiiii! Today let’s get right to it. What inspires you? What do you truly L I K E learning about or enjoy being passionate about?? Just think about it for a sec while I keep talking.. err… writing. My brother Jack is really interested in linguistics. He really enjoys learning new languages, how they came…

hi hello how are you?? (for real. “how are you?” is my favorite question to answer honestly, even if I’m not doing well!) A N Y W A Y I’m happy to be here writing again!! We got back from Italy last Thursday and I think we are juuuuust getting used to Montgomery time again….

Day Two in Italy was a BLAST! We started off day two with a big breakfast at our hotel in the garden. I had tons of fruit, eggs, bacon, and coffee (my favorites) 🙂 We had a scheduled 3 hour walking tour of San Marcos (The Doge’s Palace and the Basilica). Our tour guide was…

DAY ONE / TRAVELING & VENICE Thursday / Friday June 12 ❃ 13 Our long awaited tour of Italy is finally here!! We are so excited and ready to go. On the morning of our departure, my dad headed to work for a little bit and the rest of us spent the morning finishing up all…

These four tips have helped me in my personal journey to overcome depression and anxiety. These are simple things that you can do to feel better and be on your way to recovery. There’s no such thing as a quick fix for this issue, but these tips can hopefully help. :):):) If you haven’t yet, I…

Curious about my week?? Keep reading for my latest obsessions + embarrassments!! My whole family got back from Haiti last Thursday night and we had an awesome time. It was life changing and we are all excited to go back. I am planning on doing a recap/what I learned post from Haiti very soon!! AND we are…

I have just recently discovered how easy and delicious smoothie bowls are. At this point, I never want to go back to smoothies IN A CUP again! 😉 Smoothie bowls are so tasty because they are thicker than a shake that you would drink (MORE LIKE ICE CREAM) and you can top your bowl with…

This is not a topic that I have mentioned on my blog, but it was and still is a large burden in my life. I feel like it’s time for me to let out some of the things that have been bottled up in my head for months. I don’t like to forget things that…